Saturday, September 27, 2003
Back to the Gore Post
Let's go back to my Al Gore-titled post from Thursday night.0 comments
Along with most media outlets, Thursday's New York Times carried this story:
U.S. Income Gap Widening, Study Says
Aside from the merely distressing numbers mentioned in it, at a time when we're almost numbed by distressing numbers, there's a wealth of interesting information buried within.
First, here again, is the report's main press release.
I have had discussions about the net effect of the Clinton era, and Clinton economy, on incomes and jobs, and by extention, the general standard of living for different income groups.
I've been a solid proponent of "the 1990s raised all boats" theory. Everywhere I looked, folks in the middle classes were thinking in terms of bettering their lot. Jobs were plentiful and well paying across many different industries. Employers went begging for qualified help, often settling for the unqualified. Folks in the $30,000 — $60,000 range began to look to Wall St., and think they might have a place at the table for their retirements and their kids' education.
People earning below $30,000 began to see that there were more and better jobs than there used to be. Kids began to see life alternatives to running on the streets for cash, many of which necessitated their staying in school if they were to have a real shot at all that cash floating around out there.
We were safer, cleaner and generally happier.
Others I've talked with took me to task sternly, stating that the boom I spoke of was chickenfeed compared to the obscene amounts the folks at the top were enjoying out of this boom. They spoke of a growing disparity between richer and poorer Americans, that would come back to haunt us severely.
We were both right.
As was Al Gore, it seems.
During the campaign, I kept wondering what this "One percent" thing was all about. Just name a number, Al, I figured. "Everyone with over $1.37 million is a dope." Or "Don't talk to anyone in your company who earns more than $250,000 a year."
Give us something to go on here, big guy!
But, he just kept up with this "1%" thing until it grew so tired. No one knew who he meant anyway, and it slowly became a meaningless term.
Then, this report comes along and brings it more into focus:
In 1979, the wealthiest 1 percent had just under half the after-tax income of the poorest 40 percent of Americans, analysis of new data from the Congressional Budget Office shows.
The figures show 2000 as the year of the greatest economic disparity between rich and poor for any year since 1979, the year the budget office began collecting this data, according to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonprofit research organization in Washington that advocates tax and federal spending policies to benefit the poor. It released its analysis on Tuesday.
The richest 2.8 million Americans had $950 billion after taxes, or 15.5 percent, of the $6.2 trillion economic pie in 2000, Isaac Shapiro, a senior fellow at the center, said.
The poorest 110 million Americans had less, sharing 14.4 percent of all after tax money.
But the higher incomes of the last decade did not lift all people equally.
In 2000, the top 1 percent of American taxpayers had $862,700 each after taxes, on average, more than triple the $286,300 they had, adjusted for inflation, in 1979.
The bottom 40 percent in 2000 had $21,118 each, up 13 percent from their $18,695 average in 1979.
There's that "1%" again.
OK, this time it makes sense. Al—and we—would have been better served had he fleshed out the numbers he had a little more and gotten us a lot more pissed off, rather than merely settling for sound bites.
Starting at $286,000, then going up 33% seems a tad cheesy, yes, when 40% of the population jumps a whopping 13% to a spend-crazy $21,000.
in 2000, the top 1 percent had the largest share of the nation's total after-tax income since at least 1936 and probably since 1929.
Yes, even I must admit that this is obscene. Score one for my debate opponent.
Here's one of the points I found most interesting, however:
Both low- and middle-income people shared in the boom of the 1990's, while in the 1980's the bottom fifth experienced a decline in after-tax income, according to the budget office data analyzed by Mr. Shapiro and Robert Greenstein, director for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
The middle fifth had an average after-tax income of $41,900 in 2000, a rise of 15 percent both since 1979 and 1997, indicating a long period of no real economic gains for this group.
"You do have gains across the spectrum from 1997 to 2000," Mr. Shapiro said, "but they are much more dramatic at the top."
So, basically, from 1979 until 1997, which includes the whole of the Reagan/Bush (41) years and the recovery part of the Clinton terms, a full 60% of all of us as Americans saw our incomes and/or financial pictures stay flat or go down. Factoring in inflation, 60% of us lost money for 18 years.
Then, in 1997, the middle group, at least, found their "boats rising," gaining 15% over the next four years.
Felt pretty good there for a while, didn't it?
Then, of course, Bush (43) came in and pushed the nose of the plane straight into the ground.
Out of curiosity, do you have a job any longer? Also, do you actually have any of that "Retirement" money left?
Didn't think so. Not many do.
George W. Bush has now overseen a total of 34.6 MILLION good, hard-working, god-fearing American men, women and children being pushed below the Poverty Line.
Among racial and ethnic groups, African-Americans fared the worst last year, with a loss in median income of 3 percent and an increase in poverty to 24.1 percent from 22.7 percent a year earlier.
And though rates of poverty did not change significantly last year for those under age 18 and over age 65, staying afloat was harder last year for people aged 18 to 64—the bulk of the work force.
The poverty rate for single mothers, at 26.5 percent, remained virtually unchanged from 2001. The poverty rate did increase, however, among married couples to 5.3 percent from 4.9 percent a year earlier, a fact that could provide fodder to critics of marriage incentive programs.
The number of entire families living below the poverty line increased to 9.6 percent last year, from 9.2 percent.
The census bureau also reported a slight increase in poverty rates for children, to 16.7 percent last year from 16.3 percent the year before.
The official poverty levels, updated each year to reflect changes in the Consumer Price Index, were $18,392 for a family of four, $14,348 for a family of three, $11,756 for a two-person household and $9,183 for an individual.
The percentage of people in severe poverty, those with incomes below half of the poverty threshold, increased to 14.1 million from 13.4 million.
Look at the numbers that the Census Dept. uses to describe poverty level living. As you can see, they haven't changed in decades, and most likely the problem is many times more dire and more devastating than even these horrible numbers attest to.
Going back to the original analysis above, here's another part of it I found fascinating:
"You do have gains across the spectrum from 1997 to 2000," Mr. Shapiro said, "but they are much more dramatic at the top."
The center's analysis said the highest income Americans had grown richer from 1979 to 2000 both from gains in income because of economic prosperity and from tax cuts. Huge gains in executive pay were a significant factor, Mr. Shapiro said.
Federal tax burdens for most Americans had declined over the previous two decades, and not risen as some conservative policy experts have asserted, the center said. Congress enacted tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 that were heavily weighted to the top 1 percent, which supporters said would encourage them to invest more to the benefit of all Americans.
From 1979 to 2000, the total federal tax burden for the top 1 percent dropped 3.8 percentage points, but for the middle fifth the decline was only 1.9 percentage points. Tax rates for the poorest fifth declined 1.6 percentage points. [My emphasis]
The top 1 percent pay a quarter of all federal taxes, while the bottom 40 percent pay 6 percent of all federal taxes. [But that's in dollars, not per cent; which makes sense since they have more dollars. Duh..]
I say this all is a fabulous record of financial acheivement; one that any Republican would be damned proud to run on.
posted by Gotham 6:21 PM
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